GenColl 



E 117 
.C654 
Copy 1 



TRANSLATIONS 



53 



TRANSLATIONS 
LETTER OF COLUMBUS 

[Translated for The Magazine from the Carta de Indias, 
Madrid, 1877.] 

Letter of Cristobal Colon to the Cath- 
olic Kings, setting forth some observa- 
tions on the art of Navigation, Granada, 
February 6, 1502. 

Most High and Mighty Kings 6° Lords : 
I desire to be the cause of pleasure 
and entertainment to your Highnesses, 
and not of pain and disgust ; but since 
the pleasure and delight attach to new 
things of any interest, I shall speak 
of each in compliance with your com- 
mands as they come to my memory; 
and assuredly they will not be judged by 
their carelessness of expression, but by 
my good intentions and desires, that in 
all things I may be of service to your 
Highnesses to state only that which has 
occurred to myself ; and although my 
strength fail me and my fatigue over- 
power me, my will, as the most obliged 
and indebted of persons, shall not be 
wanting in my soul. 

Navigators and others who trade by 
sea always have a superior knowledge of 
particular parts of the world in which 
they move and have common intercourse, 
and for this reason each one of them is 
better informed concerning that which he 
sees daily than any others who may go 
thither from year to year ; and for this 
reason we receive with pleasure the re- 
lations which they themselves make of 
what they have seen and gathered, as 
certainly we gain most perfect instruction 
from that which we learn by our own ex- 
perience. 



If we consider the world spherical a> 
many writers have declared it their opin- 
ion to be, or science causes us to believe ; 
otherwise on its authority it must not be 
supposed that the temperature is equal in 
any parallel, since its diversity is as great 
on the sea as on the land. 

The sun diffuses its influence and the 
earth receives it according to the con- 
cave surfaces on mountains which are 
framed in it, and even the ancients have 
written enough on this subject as Pliny 
also who says that under the north [see 
note 1] the temperature is so mild that 
the people who live there never die ex- 
cept from vexation and disgust with life, 
and that they suffocate and destroy them- 
selves. 

Here in Spain we find a variety of tem- 
perature so great that there is no need of 
testimony from any early age of the 
world. We see here in Granada the 
mountains covered with snow all the year 
around, an evidence of great cold, while 
at the foot of the same mountain chain 
are the Alpuj arras, where the temperature 
is always mild without excessive heat or 
cold ; and as it is in this province, so it 
is among others in Spain which it would 
be prolixity to name. I say that on the 
sea the, same thing happens, especially in 
proximity with the land, and this is better 
known to those who constantly trade 
there than to those who trade in other 
regions. 

In the summer, and certainly in Anda- 
lusia, every day the sun is high, and the 
land and sea breezes blow alternately, and 
that which comes from the west is soft 
wind and lasts till evening, and in the 
same manner that this wind holds some 
time in this region, so other winds blow 



54 



TRANSLATIONS 



in other parts and regions in summer and 
winter. 

Those who constantly go from Cadiz 
to Naples know already that when they 
pass the coast of Catalonia what wind 
they will find there according to the sea- 
son, and also those who go to the Gulf 
of Narbonne. Those who wish to go from 
Cadiz to Naples, if it be winter time, go 
in sight of the Cape of Creo in Catalonia 
by the Gulf of Narbonne ; there the wind 
is very troublesome and sometimes ves- 
sels must yield and are obliged to run 
before it as far as Berueria and for this 
reason they oftener go to Cape Creo to 
keep close to the wind and reach the 
shelter of the Pomegas of Marsella, or 
the Islands of Eros, and never leave the 
coast until they arrive at their destina- 
tion. If they have to go from Cadiz to 
Naples in the summer time, they sail by 
the coast of Berueria as far as Cerdena 
or in the same manner as has been said 
of the other north coast. Some men are 
designated from their voyages who have 
so often made them that they know well 
these routes and the changes of wind 
which may be expected according to the 
season of the year in winch they are. 
Commonly to these men is given the 
name of the greater pilots, as on the 
land to the commander of an army ; so 
much so that one who knows perfectly 
the road takes his command to Font- 
arabia would not know it from here to 
Liberia. The same upon the sea, some 
are pilots of Flanders and others of the 
Levant, and of the country he most fre- 
quents. 

The trade and travel from Spain to 
Flanders is greatly prosecuted ; and great 
mariners are engaged in it. In Flanders, 



in the month of January, all the ships are 
despatched to return to their countries 
and in this month it rarely happens that 
there is not a stretch of wind either from 
the northeast or north-northeast. These 
winds at this time of year do not blow 
gently, but strong and cold, and are 
even dangerous : the distances from the 
land and the character of the earth are 
the cause which occasion this. These 
winds are not steady even though the 
weather may not have this fault ; those 
who sail with them are persons who take 
their chances, and most often arrive with 
their hands in their hair. If the easterly 
breeze fail them and any other wind blow 
hard, they must make the ports of France 
or England until another tide allows them 
to leave those ports. 

Sea-faring men are covetous of money 
and eager to return to their homes, and 
venture everything without waiting for the 
weather to settle. As it was in my cham- 
ber on another occasion, I shall inform 
your Highnesses of what is but for the 
security of this navigation ; which should 
be undertaken when the sun is in Taurus 
and be abandoned in the heaviest and 
most dangerous season of the winter. If 
the winds favor the crossing is very slack, 
no departure should be made until the 
voyage seems assured ; and this can be 
best judged of when the sky is very clear 
and the wind blows.from the north star 
and holds north always rather stiffly. 
Your Highnesses know well what hap- 
pened the year ninety-seven, when they 
suffered so in Burgos from the duration 
of the severe weather and the wind which 
followed, to escape which they went to 
Soria ; and all the court having left on 
Saturday, your Highnesses remained to 



TRANSLATIONS 



55 



leave on Monday, and that to a courier 
sent to me that night I replied in a written 
answer which I sent to your Highnesses 
that day, that the wind would begin to 
blow the next day, that the fleet ought 
not to sail, but to hold on until the wind 
strengthened, and should leave on Mon- 
day, and that on Thursday it would be as 
far as the Island of Huict, and if it did 
not put in there it would be in Laredo the 
next Monday or else the science of navi- 
gation was lost. This writing of mine, 
with the desire to await the arrival of the 
Princess, induced Your Highnesses to 
change their intentions not to go to Soria 
and to test the judgment of the sailor ; 
and on Monday a ship appeared off La- 
redo which did not go into Huict because 
it holds but few ships [see note 2]. 

There are many opinions, and there 
always have been on land and sea, as to 
the course to be pursued in similar cases, 
and to-day there are many other discov- 
ered islands ; and if that route is already 
known, those who have to trade back and 
forth there, with the perfection of instru- 
ments and construction of ships, will have 
a better knowledge of the land and winds 
and seasons most favorable to take ad- 
vantage of, and have hope for the security 
of their lives. 

May the Holy Trinity defend your 
Highnesses, for we have desire and need 
to keep your Highnesses with all their 
great estates and lordships. 

From Granada the sixth of February 
fifteen hundred and two. 

. s . 

. S. A. S . 
X M V 

:Xpo FERENS./ 



Note i. — Pone eos montes [Riphaei] ultroque 
Aquilonem, gens felix (si cradimus) quos Hyper- 
boreos appellavere, annoso elegit aevo, fabulosis 
celebrata miraculis. Ibi creduntur esse cardines 
mundi, extremi que siderum ambitus semestri 
luce et una die solis aversi : non, ut imperiti dix- 
ere, ab aequinoctio verno in autumnum. Semel 
in anno solstitio oriuntur iis soles, brumaque se- 
mel occidunt. Regis aprica, felici temperis, 
omni afflatu noxio carens. Domus iis nemora 
lucique et deorum cultus viritim gregatimque dis- 
cordia ignota et segritudo omnis. Mors non nisi 
satietate vitse, epulatis delibutoque, senio luxu, 
ex quadam rupe in mare salientibus. Hoc genus 
sepulturse beatissimum. — Plin., Hist. Nat., lib. 
IV., cap. XXVI. 

Note 2. — In January of the year 1497 the 
Catholic Kings were at Burgos, as is proved by 
the date of some ordinances which they sent 
thence, and by the relation of Galinder de Carva- 
jel, which also shows that " in the month of 
March came the Princess Margurite and wedded 
with the crown prince Don Juan, el lunes de 
Cuasimodo, 3 de abril" with great festivity. — 
(Carta de Indies, p. 658.) 



THE SIGNATURE OF COLUMBUS 
XPOFERENS 

[Translated forTHE Magazine from the Cartas de Irtdias, 
Madrid, 1877.] 

Among the signatures of Cristobal 
Colon hitherto published, as well those 
by Fray Antonio de Remesal, who was 
the first to make it known in his Historia 
General de las Indias occidentals, and 
particularly in chapter 7, " Guatemala," 
etc. (lib. iv., chap, ii., page 163), as by 
Don Martin in his Coleccion de las viages 
y Descubrimientos que hicieron por la mar 
los EspagTwles, etc., and by the his- 
torian of the Admiral, Washington Irving, 
there occur important differences which 
deserve notice. Remesal, not supposing 
that future ages would take such interest 
in this subject, printed in the page above 
mentioned the signature which, accord- 



56 



TRANSLATIONS 



ing to what he says, he had seen in a 
letter of the discoverer of the New World, 
without any explanation, and merely 
"because some curious person might de- 
sire to exercise his ingenuity in its inter- 
pretation," and also without fixing or 
giving their true value to certain charac- 
teristic details decisive of its authenticity, 
without explaining its omissions or giving 
a justification of its punctuation, which 
he considered as equal in all the initials 
of the ante-signature, and taking the lib- 
erty also of figuring the word represent- 
ing the name of Cristobal, translating and 
writing them in this manner 
s. 
s. a. s. 

X. M. A. 

Christo fcrens. 
In the fifteen autograph letters of the 
great mariner which Navarrete found in 
the archives of the Lord Duke de Ver- 
agua, and in those coming from other 
quarters, which he printed jointly with 
them in volumes I. and II. of his Colec- 
eion, he said nothing, and Washington 
Irving was equally silent in regard to the 
rubric which the discoverer placed on the 
left side of his signature ; omitting like- 
wise one of the stops between which is 
placed the first S of the two which are 
in the second line of the initials of the 
ante-signature, and although that which 
precedes the S. of the first line in many 
cases (stops which the Anglo-American 
writer did not forget to place), and like- 
wise suppressing in it the oblique line, 
the direction of which is from outside 
inwardly, which encloses the word KER- 
ENS, which Washington Irving showed, 
although without accompanying it with 
the corresponding stop. But the most 



striking variation, which can alone be 
ascribed to thoughtlessness on the part 
of Navarrete, is to be observed in the 
manner of writing the Xpo, in the ab- 
breviation of which he made use of cap- 
ital letters, while Irving, more true to the 
original, only placed the letter X in this 
class and the po in small letters, and 
prolonged the upper right stroke of the 
versal to supply the dark abbreviation 
sign, as in the letter ; the signatures re- 
sulting in the following form : 



According to Nav- 
arrete. 

s. 

S. A. S. 
X M Y 
XPO KERENS 



According to Wash- 
ington Irving. 

.s. 

.S. A. S. 
X M Y 
Xe? FERENS/ 



That the celebrated Spanish Indian- 
ographers omitted these particulars there 
is no doubt, since in some of the fifteen 
letters found which we have had the 
pleasure to examine, thanks to the good 
will of Senor don Cristobal Colon de la 
Cerda, the present Duke of Veragua, 
and in which, besides the rubric that pre- 
cedes the signature in the facsimile B, 
the two points and rays are clearly seen. 
But it is difficult to explain a similar 
error in a person so minutely precise as 
the author of the " Criterion de Viages," 
who asserts that the signatures of Colon 
written in other ways to be apocryphal, 
such, for instance, as the one in which 
the initials X. M. Y. were punctuated, 
and the Latin I in place of the Greek Y. 
and those which present separately and 
not in continuation of the initials the 
XPO KERENS, as is established in the 
document, evidently not authentic, dis- 
covered in the Library of the Cara de 



TRANSLATIONS 



57 



Corsini at Rome, with the title of Codi- 
cilltis more militarii Cristophori Columbi, 
upon which is placed datum Valledoliti 4 
Mai, 1506, and which shows this signa- 
ture : 

.s. 

S. A. S. 

X. M. I. XPOFERENS. 

Besides these peculiarities, we have ob- 
served in the Admiral's manner of signa- 
ture, that only in the olograph writings 
the complementary rubric of the signa- 
ture is made use of, and not in those 
which are wanting in this particular, as 
any one may satisfy himself who will 
compare the facsimiles A and B (in the 
Cartas de Indias), noting also that in 
each of these documents he placed the 
two stops which precede the Xpo FER- 
ENS as in the second facsimile B, and 
in a letter preserved by the General 
don Eduardo Fernandez San Roman, 
while in those which the Lord Duke of 
Veraguas was obliging enough to show 
us he appears to have omitted it, although 
this cannot be affirmed with certainty 
when it concerns documents " much in- 
jured by time, the ink obscured or faded 
out, and the margins creased or torn, 1 ' 
as, according to Navarrete (Vol. L, p. 
477), were the letters which by his dili- 
gence were discovered in the archives of 
the descendants of the Admiral. Be- 
tween the one and the other of these au- 
tographs it is likewise to be considered 
that in the familiar letters the sign of 
abbreviation appears distinctly, and that 
in those written to the Kings the prolon- 
gation of the arm of the X ; from which it 
is to be deduced that the great mariner 
did not confine himself to any fixed rules 
as to this stop, as sometimes, also, he 



subscribed for the Xpo FERENS by the 
title of the office he was at the time fill- 
ing, as may be seen in the document 
where he treats of the establishment of 
his family estates, famous from the suit 
which was pleaded February 22, 1498, 
which the aforesaid Navarrete gave to 
light in this manner : 

.S. 

S.A.S. 

X M Y 

El Almiratite. 

Now, in the instruments of August 3, 
1499, in the names of the Catholic kings, 
he made to the trader, Pedro de Salcedo, 
conceding to him the exclusive privilege 
for life of cutting hard wood in the Island 
of Hispaniola, he signed his name in this 
manner : 

.S. 

S.A.S. 

X M Y 

VI R E Y 

But ordinarily he signed, as has been 
shown, with the Xpo FERENS. Of the 
fifteen autographs mentioned as in the 
archives of the Duke de Veragua, pub- 
lished by Fernandez Navarrete, "four 
addressed to his great friend, Fray Don 
Gaspar Gorricio, monk of the Monastery 
of Santa Maria de las Cuevas de la Car- 
tuja de Sevilla, and eleven to his son and 
heir, Don Diego Colon," all are signed 
in the same manner, except one done 
in Seville, February 25, 1505 (fifteen 
months before the death of the Ad- 
miral), in which he suppressed the in- 
itials, and only signed with capital and 
small letters, as we make them, in this 
manner : 

Xpo Ferens. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



58 



TRANSLATIONS 




011 563 904 3 



It seems easy to comprehend the sig- 
nificance of these words written " partly 
in Greek and partly in Latin," as Don 
Nicolas de Azara wrote from Rome to 
Don Juan Bautista Mnnoz on the 12th 
of February, 1 784. 

But is it known what it was if the ini- 
tials preceded the Christo Ferens. Wash- 
ington Irving says that to read them we 
must begin by the lower letters, combin- 
ing them with those above ; Juan Bau- 
tista Spoterno conjectures that they sig- 
nify #// Xristus, Sancte Maria, Josephus, 
oh Salvame Xristus, Maria, Josephus ; 
and in the North American Review for 
April, 1827, the substitution of Jesus for 
Josephus is suggested. Such a substitu- 
tion should not, in our judgment, be ac- 
cepted, because of the redundancy it 
implies, since Jesus and Christus are 
synonymous, and Josephus would com- 
plete the invocation, now quite common, 
of Jesus, Maria, and Jose. Were we to 
share this opinion, we should also substi- 
tute Salve for Salvatne. 

•5- 

5. V? J - 

•' JF/>° FE A Fits' J 

EULOGY OF COLUMBUS. 

[Translated for The Magazine.] 

Funeral sermon in eulogy of his Ex- 
cellency, Sefior Don Cristoval Colon, 
Admiral-in-Chief, Vice-Roy, and Gov. 
ernor-General of the West Indies, their 
discoverer and conqueror, delivered on 



occasion of the removal of his remains 
from the Metropolitan Church of Saint 
Domingo, to the Cathedral of our Lady 
of the Conception, at Havana, by Doctor 
Don Jose Augustin Caballero, Master of 
Philosophy in the Royal and Councillor 
Seminary College of San Carlos and San 
Ambrosia, on the morning of January 
19th, in the year 1796. 

To the Most Illustrious Governor of 
this city of Havana : 

Illustrious Sir! If I made the sacrifice 
of my health and of some of my occupa- 
tions when I undertook to prepare a 
funeral eulogium upon the ever-famous 
Admiral Don Cristoval Colon, now that 
Your Excellency has deigned to request 
a copy for publication, I sacrifice all the 
force of my talents, and lose all my tran- 
quillity of mind. The first sacrifice was 
an homage cheerfully and justly rendered 
to my friend Sefior Don Diego Jose Perez 
Rodrigues, Canon of this cathedral ; this 
second is a polite deference to the most 
flattering desire and persuasions of Your 
Excellency. From one and the other I 
might derive an incontestable right to 
claim a double indulgence. But when 
Your Excellency, to the courtesies with 
which you honored me in your official 
letter of January 29th following, added 
the request to print my sermon, no doubt 
that the world may not be ignorant of 
the smallest detail of the demonstrations 
made by Havana in honor of the obse- 
quies of the discoverer of the Americas, 
Your Excellency felt obliged to tender 
to me his protection — a condescension 
which, on the part of Your Excellency, 
is a simple expression of his generosity, 
will be to me an honor and an advantage. 
An honor ? — who would not feel it such 



